1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to managing business critical data in a computer, and in particular, to viewing and manipulating a hierarchical form of such data.
2. Description of Related Art
Master Data Management™ (MDM) (also known as an MDM application), available from the assignee of the present invention, is an application that allows users to manage their business critical data. This critical data can originate from a myriad of sources and external feeds, but ultimately, the goal is that all of this data be consolidated into a central business data warehouse. Master Data Management™ is the process and framework for maintaining a series of business rules and process workflows that will manage this data as it feeds in from multiple sources. Master Data Management™ then applies these business rules and process workflows to produce “master” data, which is then fed to all consuming business processes.
Core to the management of master data is the definition of a data model. The data model serves as the foundation for all business rules and workflow processes within the Master Data Management™ (MDM) framework. The data model represents the form the master data must ultimately take in the customer's data warehouse to be used by the consuming business applications.
A significant portion of the business critical master data consists of “data relationship” data itself. Relationship data is the data required to manage the association of one piece of data (typically a data entity or table) to another. The Data Relationship can take the form of a hierarchy or a direct reference or any other association. Management of the relationship or association requires data and business processes that are key to the concept of Master Data Relationship Management.
MDM provides hierarchy management features that are built using the Adobe™ Flex™ technology (an open source framework for building highly interactive, expressive web applications). Adobe™ Flex™ technology is used to meet the rich user interface (UI) requirements of managing, visualizing and editing Master Data Relationships in the form of hierarchies.
Adobe™ provides an IDE (integrated development/design environment) named Flex Builder™ that can assist in building Flex™ based UI. Flex™ provides two programming languages:                MXML (.mxml files) to describe the visual layout; and        ActionScript (.as files) to include the business logic.        
Adobe™ also provides an SDK (software development kit) that can be used for compiling code in the above programming languages. On compilation, the output is a swf file. Swf is the acronym for “Shockwave Flash” pronounced as swiff.
Most modern browsers have a plug-in for Flash™ (known as Flash Player™), installed on their computer. Flash Player™ enables users to run or play the swf files. Swf files can also be embedded in an html file for rendering on browsers.
Flex Builder™ produces a wrapper html file that has Javascript™ (js) code and swf file references in it. The Javascript™ code performs checks (e.g., the version of flash player, etc.).
While the Flex™ Hierarchy UI provides an important role from a representation and viewing perspective, the UI is required to be a part of the MDM data management workflows. A common requirement for customers in a MDM context is the ability to search for a certain entity, view it in the hierarchy and then launch a maintenance workflow for that record. However, since the Flex™ technology is different from the standard MDM UI framework (PGL [Page Layout], which is a J2EE [Java™ 2 Platform Enterprise Edition], HTML [hypertext markup language] based technology), there is no way for the PGL Workflow UI and Flex™ Hierarchy UI's to easily interact.
To solve the interaction problem, a method is needed to bridge the PGL Workflow UI and Adobe™ Flex™ technologies together. In addition, the flow of interaction must provide bi-directional support so that one can go from a PGL Workflow UI into a Flex™ UI, as well as from a Flex™ UI into a PGL Workflow UI.
Prior art methods/companies have generalized solutions for viewing and manipulating hierarchical data (e.g. StarBEAM™ available from Entreon™ Corporation). However, the prior art fails to provide a solution that integrates rich internet hierarchy UI's, the management of hierarchies, the visualization and direct manipulation of hierarchies and business process workflows into a Master Data Management solution.